


The Many Blushes of Hyuuga Hinata

by Memories_of_the_Shadows



Category: Naruto
Genre: Bisexuality, Blushing, Crushes, Denial of Feelings, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, Female Friendship, Fluff, Fluffy Ending, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Lovers to Friends, M/M, Male-Female Friendship, Multiple Partners, Multiple Relationships, Not A Fix-It, Romantic Fluff, Sappy, Self-Discovery, Slice of Life, Stalking, This covers years in canon time, in the closet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-18 04:19:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13674138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Memories_of_the_Shadows/pseuds/Memories_of_the_Shadows
Summary: Over many years, Sakura learns why she likes it when Hinata blushes, and how to live without until she doesn't have to anymore.





	The Many Blushes of Hyuuga Hinata

Sakura first notices Hyuuga Hinata when she sees the girl watching Naruto everyday after training. Of course, she _knows_ who Hinata is, is hardly going to forgot one of the few girls in her class to be anything close to nice to her besides Ino. But Hinata is _quiet_ , and shy, so it’s easy to not _notice_ her.

The other girl is stalking her teammate, and Sakura almost wants to clue Naruto in, but at least Hinata’s not stalking _Sasuke_. That’s Sakura’s job, and Team 10 keeps Ino busy enough that she doesn’t have a lot of competition anymore. Plus, it’s almost cute to see how oblivious Naruto is to all of Hinata’s shy, sweet, full-face blushes.

It’s nice, too, that Sakura gets to see someone besides Naruto who seems happy to see her. (It was easy, in the Academy, to ignore the fact that Sasuke was _never_ happy to see _anybody_. It’s a little different when he is one of four people she sees daily, not one of more than twenty.) So she starts waving ‘hi’ to Hinata whenever she sees her.

The first time she does, Hinata squeaks and disappears for almost an entire week.

The next time--and Hinata has great timing, the byakugan must be good for that, because Naruto is in a great mood and Kakashi-sensei hasn’t made them do anything disgusting yet--Hinata’s face goes even redder, and she squeaks again, but she stays for a few minutes more because Naruto is smiling at something Kakashi-sensei is saying and Hinata clearly cannot tear her eyes away.

The fifth time Sakura waves, Hinata actually waves back, her face burning redder than Sakura had thought possible.

///////////////////////

After that disastrous mission to Nami--where it had been made _quite_ clear to Sakura that she is in no way prepared to actually _be_ a ninja and neither is anyone else in her team, really (though Kakashi-sensei still doesn’t _teach_ , probably because Naruto and Sasuke don’t _listen_ , and Sakura has no idea how to start on her own)--it takes all the way up to walking into the chuunin exams for Sakura to see Hinata again.

Even though they’re in public, with all their teams around them, Sakura can’t help the jaunty little wave at the other girl. It earns her some odd looks from Ino and possibly Shino (though Sakura can’t actually tell with the high collar and the sunglasses), though Naruto remains as oblivious as ever, Sasuke appears to have no care for anything but gauging how ready anyone is to fight him, as usual, and the rest either have no reason to care, or simply don’t, like Kiba.

Hinata’s face goes as red as a tomato and Sakura is sure she sees steam coming from the other girl’s ears. It is _adorable_. Sakura is sure that Naruto is missing out on the best hobby in the world with his cluelessness.

///////////////////

Sakura had not known how _stubborn_ Hinata was.

At least as stubborn as Naruto, which means that the other girl is definitely as stubborn as _Sasuke_ \--if not more--who is currently trying to give Sakura heart problems with his insistence that the creepy seal he got in the Forest that nearly killed him and has _definitely_ influenced him is absolutely none of her, or anyone else's, including medic-nin, concern.

There are no blushes, no shy smiles, no cute nervous gestures. No, instead, Hinata is getting resoundly beaten by her older, more technically skilled cousin because she _won’t give up_ and Sakura can do nothing but _watch_.

She likes Hinata, likes her more than Ino or her teammates sometimes, even though they’ve yet to actually have a conversation since the Academy. The only times that Sakura has felt more useless than right now, this very moment, was the mission to Nami and fighting those genin from Kusa and Oto in the Forest of Death. Sakura _watches_ as the other girl gets up, _watches_ as Hinata is hit one last time. _Watches_ the girl cough up blood, nearly dying, and itches to do _something_.

Her fingers twitch, and when she looks back on it, Sakura can confidently say that the idea may have been there before but this is the first time she actually _thinks_ about becoming a medic-nin. (Clearly, she is the only one with more sense than stubbornness, and _someone_ needs to keep these idiots alive.)

////////////////

It’s been three years since Naruto left, a little more since Sasuke did, and Sakura sometimes feels lonely.

She has lots of friends, Ino and Chouji still train with her on occasion even though their team was only formed for the chuunin exams, and Ino has definitely moved on from their rivalry over Sasuke so they can even hold normal conversations now; even though the blonde cannot _stand_ being shown up by Sakura in anything. Shikamaru enjoys playing shoji with her on the rare occasion they both have free time. Shizune has wonderful blackma-- _stories_ about her time traveling with Tsunade-shishou and loves to share them. Lee has given up trying to date Sakura after he walked in on Tenten stealing her first kiss and opening her eyes to _a lot of things_ , but he is still just as enthusiastic about being her friend. Even Kakashi-sensei is willing to eat ramen with her once a month provided Sakura is paying.

But Sakura is still lonely. She misses her teammates, misses the time with them when all she had to worry about was what stupid d-rank Kakashi-sensei would make them do and how hard she could make Hinata blush the next time the girl showed up to watch Naruto.

Sometimes, when she is feeling especially nostalgic, Sakura picks up one of those stupid d-ranks; which _baffles_ Tsunade-shishou and Sakura honestly has no idea why she does it, it’s never the same.

Hinata has grown into herself too, and no longer stutters when she speaks, no longer blushes when Sakura waves at her in the street, and even when Sakura straight up _talks_ to her the only thing she gets is the lightest dusting of pink.

But Naruto is returning today, and Sakura hopes that him coming back will mean a return to being a part of something more personal than the hospital. So, of course, she’s there when he walks through the gates with Jiraiya; all tanned, golden, and ecstatic to see them. Hinata takes one look at him, ‘meeps’, and blushes a full-faced, tomato red.

Sakura takes one look at Hinata and realizes why she likes it when the other girl blushes--Hinata is normally so beautiful and untouchable, the blush makes her seem _human_ and **_adorable_** \--and her own face goes so hot that if it was winter she’d be steaming.

“You little idiot,” Tenten says, laughing so hard she starts to cry when Sakura confronts her ex with this later that night. “Why do you think I broke up with you?”

“I-I thought, maybe, Sasuke…” Sakura mumbles, still blushing as her second (maybe third, did she have a crush on Ino in the Academy? Maybe, yeah…) ever _real_ crush is laughed at by her first (second, Ino totally counts). Tenten proceeds to nearly suffocate herself from laughing so hard, hardly even able to breathe after the first minute. Sakura is less and less inclined to heal the brunette the longer it goes on.

///////////////////

It’s been a couple months since Naruto came back--ridiculously busy ones too, Sakura fought and _killed_ an S-rank missing nin from Akatsuki (she’s _still_ getting the bounty rewards from that) and watched the Kazekage come back to life all on the same mission--and her crush on Hinata has not gone away in the slightest.

The other girl has taken to visiting their training grounds again--never for as long as when they were kids, but long enough--to watch Naruto train and blush. Sakura, because she is definitely a masochist, has taken to cataloguing Hinata’s blushes.

Most of the time, when it’s just Sakura trying not to fall flat on her face and actually hold a conversation with her, Hinata has the politely-interested-I-hope-I-don’t-embarrass-you blush that is just a light dusting of the lightest pink on her cheeks. Sakura _hates_ that one. It makes Hinata look perfectly pretty, but it means that Hinata doesn’t feel comfortable with the person. At least, she thinks so.

Today, though, it’s Hinata’s Naruto-kun-is-so-confident-and-strong-I-love-him blush--which Sakura _also_ hates because it makes her jealous of _Naruto_ \--which is dark red roses of color on the other girl’s round cheeks. It’s the one that Sakura sees most often, because Hinata is definitely back to stalking Naruto, and it’s cute whenever Sakura stops feeling jealous.

Naruto notices her distraction, though, and because he’s sparring with Kakashi-sensei he thinks he can get away with his oiroke no jutsu because their sensei is definitely a pervert. Naruto does make an exceptionally hot girl, but he’d be better served by Konohamaru’s guy version, because Tenten knows plenty of _secrets_ about her own sensei and is as willing to share them as Shizune (between the two of them, Sakura knows more Village gossip than _Ino_ , and that’s saying something), not that Sakura thinks she’ll ever _have_ to blackmail Gai. He loses the spar with the next hit, because Kakashi-sensei is _mean_ when he wants to be.

But it’s Hinata’s blush that makes Sakura run face first into a tree. She _knows_ that blush, even though she’s only seen it once when they were both very drunk. Ino had conned all of them--Sakura, Hinata, and Tenten--into going to a sex toy party at her house for her birthday and gotten them drunk enough that no one left. It’s her oh-kami-sama-am-I-aroused-in-public-please-end-me blush that is not content to stay on her face but sneaks down her throat and into her jacket, and curls around her ears, and it is the kind of red that makes Sakura worry that Hinata will have a stroke.

And it’s because Naruto turned into a girl.

Sakura is at once so happy and so distracted by this that she doesn’t even bother to punch Naruto for being a pervert, or Sai for commenting on her failure to dodge a stationary object.

/////////////////

Naruto is apparently not as oblivious as Sakura thought he was, because a few weeks of Sakura dithering over ‘what this could mean’ and Hinata continuing to show up to their training grounds whenever she is in the Village has him cornering Sakura after practice and once they’ve managed to ditch Sai.

“Are ya dating Hinata-chan?” he asks, and, really, his timing could not be better. Sakura has always wanted to spit a mouthful of ramen at Ayame, really, and this is just an excuse. It’s got to be a joke. She sneaks a look at him.

It’s not a joke. Naruto has his serious face on, the one where his blue eyes are open and staring right into your soul, but he’s not not smiling or frowning or making a silly face _at all_. Sakura chokes a little, because she hasn’t even come out to her _parents_ , let alone anybody but Tenten and Lee. “No…?” she says, and hates that it comes out sounding more like a question because _yes_ she would _really fucking like it_ if she was dating Hinata but they’re not. Might never.

“Huh? But ya really like her, and she keeps coming around whenever ya’re at the training grounds.” And, oh, that hurts. Reminded that the girl she has a crush on has been in love with her teammate since forever.

Sakura hesitates right up until Naruto crosses his arms over his chest and glares. (Well, not really _glares_. Naruto is actually incapable of a proper glare [not like Sasuke who she's fairly sure she caught practicing in mirror once]--it tends to look more like a cross between a pout and puppy dog eyes--but he does _try_.) She gives in with a huff. “She’s not there for me, idiot.” Blue eyes blink at her uncomprehendingly.

“What, _Sai_!?” Both of them gag at the thought, and Naruto quickly switches gears. “Kakashi-sensei…? But he’s so _old_ , that’s gross!” Sakura finally smacks him over the head.

“No, _you_ , idiot!” Naruto at a loss for words is probably the strangest thing Sakura has ever seen, with his mouth dropped open, eyes wide, and a finger pointed at himself like he can’t believe it. “Since forever,” she confirms even though her stomach twists into knots at it.

“…Uh, wow, really…?” Sakura doesn’t answer because she knows Naruto heard her, and she _really_ doesn’t want to say it again. Naruto grins, rubbing the back of his head, a slight blush on his face. “Hinata-chan is really pretty. And she was always real nice to me. But what about ya?”

She smiles, even though it makes her cheeks hurt and her stomach knot in on itself, and says, “You make her happy. That’s all I’d ever want for the both of you.” And even though it feels a little like defeat and a lot like sadness, Sakura still manages to be happy for Naruto--who still looks amazed that _anybody_ likes him like that--and for Hinata, who is about to have her dreams come true if Sakura knows anything at all.

//////////////////

Hinata is around both more and less than ever before. More, because instead of hovering at the edge of the training ground pretending she’s there by chance, she now takes lunches with them and occasionally trains herself. Less, because so many things seem to be happening all at once and _everyone_ is busy.

They finally become friends, mostly through Naruto’s determined effort not to let Sakura ditch them like she still does Sai. Sakura was right, all those years ago, about Hinata being just as stupidly stubborn about some things as Naruto. She just hides it better. (It would drive her crazy to deal with them if Hinata took after Naruto in being stubborn about not being wrong, but luckily the girl was able to be reasoned with, so long as one kept a close watch afterward to make sure she didn’t just placate you and turn around to do it anyway.) But she was also just as sweet, kind, and patient as Sakura had always imagined her to be.

Her blushes stick around longer too, and if Sakura sometimes watches Hinata and Naruto more closely than Sai or Kakashi-sensei do, well, no one notices her doing so and Sakura is a masochist because she even likes the little knife-twist-gut-punch feeling of seeing the two of them happy and in love. Tenten is always happy to point that out to her, even though they both already know it.

Sakura tries to work up the courage to tell her parents. Even though she is not dating anyone, she wants to be honest with them. Wants to be honest with herself. The day after she decides to do this eventually, Pein attacks the Village.

Even after unleashing her chakra in unison with Tsunade to heal the Village, people die. Sakura can feel every one of them. Kakashi-sensei, Shizune, Tsunade. So many others. Her parents. And then Hinata winks out of existence.

Naruto’s primal scream, threaded through with the Kyuubi’s towering rage, is echoed by Sakura’s dry sobs. No one else is quite sure how many they’ve lost, but Sakura knows, digs deep into chakral pathways that have already been scrapped bare and there’s not enough for everyone. She swallows her fear and pain, tries to keep those still living alive, and pushes away her regrets. There is no room for them now.

Miracles happen though, even as Sakura is laid up in her hospital for severe chakra exhaustion, and things can never be normal again but at least those they lost were returned. Sakura does not tell her parents.

///////////////////

Hinata comes to sit with Sakura after Sai leaves. They are as alone as they can get in the war camp and normally that would be enough to send a frisson of heat through Sakura’s veins but the war has ended with so many casualties, so many people Sakura failed to save, that all she feels is numb.

Sasuke and Naruto are a little ways away, heads facing each other even though they blew each other’s arms off, talking and laughing lowly. It makes a dull ache spring to life in her chest, the thought that Sakura will once again be pushed to the sidelines by her teammates. Sakura still hasn’t told anyone she is gay except for Tenten and Lee. She supposes it won’t matter soon enough. Sasuke is back, and Sakura knows that people expect them to marry, restore his clan.

Would it be so bad? To have children with her old teammate and watch from the sidelines as her longest lasting crush fulfills her every dream? Her head says no, but the sinking feeling in her stomach says yes. Hinata takes Sakura’s hand with a blush that Sakura has yet to catalogue.

She can feel the pads of scar tissue on Hinata’s middle and index fingers, the callouses on her palm. Their hands are the same size, but Hinata’s are far more elegant, more suited to flourish and art than Sakura’s blunt, precise hands. Sakura has wanted to hold hands with Hinata for years. Of course it would happen when she has zero chance of getting anything more.

“Naruto-kun told me,” Hinata says in her soft, delicate voice that Sakura could listen to for hours on end. Sakura glances at her two teammates--and she gets the feeling Hinata does too, though with the byakugan there’s no guarantee that Sakura would know for sure--and Naruto gives her a thumbs-up with his remaining hand. Weird.

“What did Naruto tell you?” Sakura asks, because Naruto talks nigh on constantly about anything that catches his interest. Even through the numbness, Sakura likes the feel of Hinata’s hand in hers, though she tries not to like it too much. Maybe this is Hinata trying to tell her she doesn’t blame Sakura for Neji’s death. That’s okay. Sakura blames herself enough for everyone.

It feels like Hinata is looking at Naruto again, only this time there is a small, disapproving frown on her face. Naruto chokes dramatically, and Sasuke chuckles, so Sakura doesn’t bother to worry. She savors this moment, because she knows she will never get another chance like this. “He told me you like me,” Hinata explains, squeaking a little at the end. As if she cannot understand why Sakura would like someone so kind, beautiful, dedicated, intelligent, adorable. The bottom drops out of Sakura’s stomach.

“I’d never come between you two,” she breathes, desperately pulling at her hand. Sakura does not want to be rejected, not when they are at least friends and she knows they cannot have anything more. Not when Sakura is steeling herself to be the mother of Sasuke’s children because that is what will be expected of her. Hinata’s full lips smooth into a stubborn line and she holds onto Sakura’s hand until the choices are stop fighting or channel chakra and possibly hurt Hinata. Sakura stops fighting.

“I-I know,” Hinata says with a blush. “He said you told him I loved him. That you wanted the both of us to be happy.” Those deceptively delicate fingers trace nonsense patterns into Sakura’s skin and it feels like a brand. Her heartbeat quickens like it never has with Sasuke and Sakura wonders if it would have been better to just be rejected.

“That’s all I’ve ever wanted.” It’s true. Even though Sakura wishes that Hinata could be happy with her, it’s enough that she _is_ happy. Naruto, too, is her friend and teammate. Sakura would pull down mountains to fill in the sea to make the ones she loves happy. Hinata does not stop tracing those nonsense patterns into Sakura’s skin, even though her blush deepens. Sakura likes this blush, more than she should.

“Naruto-kun is very stubborn when he wants to be,” confides Hinata, her button nose scrunched up in distaste. Sakura wants to laugh but the bottom of her stomach is still missing.

“So are you,” slips out before Sakura can stop the tease. Hinata blushes again, differently--more of an I'm-embarassed-stop, than whatever it was before that made her face pink and her cheeks red--and sticks her tongue out. This time Sakura actually does laugh, the short bark startled out of her. It is always so easy to talk to Hinata, Sakura has found. She is mind-bogglingly stubborn, yes, but rarely offended and always kind. The shyness is only a hurdle for a short while, once it’s gone, there is no one better to talk to.

“We decided to just be friends.” Hinata is probably looking at Naruto again, but Sakura still cannot tell. Honestly, she thinks she might be in shock. Maybe a concussion. “We fight too much.” And that admission just certifies that Sakura is dreaming. Naruto and Hinata never fight, not the ways that Sakura understands the term, though she is sure that she will fight with Sasuke a lot and despair coats her throat. She says so, about Naruto and Hinata, and Hinata’s nose scrunches up again. “We don’t listen to each other. And besides,” this time Hinata actually turns her head to look at Naruto and Sasuke lying together. Sakura looks at them too, but sees nothing unusual, just two heads bent together like she’s seen a thousand times before. At least Sai likes her better than he does Naruto, Sasuke never gave her that consideration. Nothing that would cause Hinata’s next words, “he likes someone else more than me.”

“You made him happy. You were happy too.” Sakura knows that she is trying to sabotage her only chance with Hinata, even if this is all a dream. Hinata’s strange blush returns full force from where it had faded, and her white eyes don’t quite meet Sakura’s.

“I-I think I-I could be happier. With someone else.” The pads of scar tissue on Hinata’s fingers feel strange against her skin, and every brush feels like a forest fire being lit. “I still love Naruto-kun. But only as a friend.”

“Why are you telling me?” They had become friends, it’s true, but Hinata didn’t owe Sakura an explanation, didn’t owe her anything. Just the memory of holding hands with her, the memory of Hinata painting her skin with fire, is enough to last her for years. Years of denial and heartache. Naruto and Sasuke don’t have a monopoly on poor decision making in Team 7, Sakura and Kakashi-sensei are pretty good at it too. It says something bad that Sai is the most sensible member of their team.

Hinata glances back again, and this time Naruto responds. They shake their heads, frowns, glares, and stares all combining to make an impressive silent conversation that Sakura has no idea what it could be about. Neither does Sasuke by the look of him. Sakura is beginning to believe Hinata when she says they fight a lot, because both look incredibly stubborn, Naruto with his jaw set and Hinata with her mouth pressed. She isn’t even sure which of them loses in the end, only knowing the argument is over when Hinata turns back to her.

“Hinata-chan?” Sakura prompts, because Hinata is just staring at her with a blush on her face, the same unfamiliar one they started the conversation with. They are still holding hands, but Sakura is not about to draw attention to it. What if Hinata pulls away?

She ‘meeps’ and affection fights through the numbness and fear, Sakura stops herself from grinning sillily. Faster than Sakura can track even with years of battle experience, there are lips on hers, a soft but calloused hand on her cheek.

The lips are full, soft and unbitten--very different to Tenten’s, Sakura’s only other experience--and so, so warm against hers. The warmth spreads and mingles with the fire that Hinata has painted on her skin until Sakura is melting against the hand with the fingers with pads of scar tissue just brushing her ear, almost threading into her hair. It feels like it lasts forever, but when Hinata draws back, fidgeting, blushing, and nearly steaming in embarrassment, Sakura feels like it has been far too short. Breathing is harder even than when Sakura first started training with Tsunade-shishou, and she wants to do that again and again and again until it’s seared into her brain.

It had been a soft kiss, chaste and hesitant because however strong and stubborn she _knows_ Hinata can be, she is still shy and disbelieving of her own worth. But the edge of fire, want, and _more_ was there and Sakura will happily spend the rest of her life chasing it. Life won’t be perfect, and telling people will be hard--for both of them--but Sakura can think of no other way she wants to live.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a while ago and wasn't sure if I was going to write more for it or not. I remembered it a couple days ago and thought it would be the perfect thing to post for Valentine's Day, so I hope you all like it! This shows more than a few of my headcanons about Hinata, specifically that she's the type of stubborn, but shy, introvert who will say 'okay' and then do it anyway. She's always been one of my favorites, even though Kishimoto really did not do her justice, because I really identified with her a lot when I was young. Thank you for reading!


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